They’ve won all kinds of awards, including Memphis in May 1st Place Pork for years in a row. I’ve never been to MiM, but I have been a couple of times to its (unaffiliated) kosher cousin – the ASBEE/Kroger Kosher Barbecue Contest and Festival, also in Memphis. Here are some pics from one year we went:

Yeah! Also, I’m not sure if they still do this, but Corky’s, whose owners are Jewish, once or twice made a bunch of kosher barbecue, ribs, chicken, etc. and shipped it all over for a Memphis school fundraiser. I don’t know if they de-treyfed everything temporarily or made it all in a different kitchen or what.

I’m not sure *why* they made it NE AL and not just all of north Alabama…H’ville isn’t exactly in the middle, but…if you ask most people what a city in NE AL is they would probably come up with Scottsboro or Ft. Payne more times than H’ville. Anyway.

Okay, so they had the poll for best bbq and Big Bob’s only got 8% of the vote (which, to bring up the directional thing again, Decatur is north-central and not NE so maybe that had something to do with it). Still. Eight percent!

The winner was Big Cove BBQ in Owens Cross Roads and second place was New Market BBQ. Definitely need to try both of those now.

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Garden & Gun has a photo gallery that includes Big Bob Gibson’s at last weekend’s NYC Big Apple Barbecue Block Party. Picture #12 shows Jim ‘n Nicks (also from AL) serving a plate with smoked sausages and some really good-looking pimento cheese. Yum. Oh, and at the festival they even had seminars, including:

A native of New Orleans, Chef John Currence of Oxford, Mississippi’s City Grocery Restaurant Group designs his menus around classic Creole French and Deep South technique with a backbone of local and seasonal ingredients. So it’s no surprise to learn that when it comes to tamales, John doesn’t limit himself to beef and corn husks. Watch as he demonstrates his recipes for dressed up Mississippi Delta Tamales – contemporary versions of the region’s signature preparation – including one featuring that old Southern favorite, Pimento Cheese.

The next time we’re in Oxford, we’ve got to go to his new restaurant, Big Bad Breakfast which has already been recognized by Esquire and Bon Apetit. And at the bottom of BBB’s website, the fresh-squeezed juice is mentioned along with where they source different ingredients, including this:

We use Mississippi State cheese whenever we can…only because there is no Rebel Cheese, which would surely be more tasteful and refined.